Making Financial Education a Social Responsibility Priority at Companies

In a 2014 survey by PricewaterhouseCoopers, nearly one in four employees admitted that financial issues have been a distraction at work, and 39% had spent three hours or more per week thinking about or dealing with their personal finances, with basic personal financial management and not being able to pay for college being among those concerns.  As reported by Time.com writer, Dan Kadlec, “This impacts employee productivity; employee financial stress can cost up to $5,000 per employee per year.” As if those numbers alone aren’t startling enough, Junior Achievement’s 2015 Teens and Personal Finance Survey, sponsored by The Allstate Foundation, was released earlier this month and revealed some of the following staggering discrepancies between teens and their parents’ personal finance and money management views and habits:

Finding #1:  Money Management Education

84% of teens look to their parents to learn money management, but 34% of parents do not discuss money with their children and let the “kids be kids”.

Finding #2:  Paying for College

48% of teens think their parents will pay for college, but only 16% of parents actually plan to pay their child’s college costs.

Finding #3: Gender Gap

Girls and boys have sharply differing expectations around how much they will earn at their first “real” job: 24% of girls think they will make $15,000 or less at their first job compared to only 16% of boys who feel the same.

Additionally, when it comes to discussing money with their children, there is a significant gender divide in the conversation. Specifically, girls are more likely than boys to say their parents don’t talk to them enough about money management (40 percent versus 24 percent) and about paying for college (34 percent versus 23 percent).

With the regular chaos and routine that accompanies work life, it can be easy to overlook personal life and the fact that a majority of employees are also parents. Among the 34.4 million families with children, 88.2 percent have at least one employed parent, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. While companies can’t be expected to fix all the financial problems employees face, they certainly can take some measures to reduce their employees’ financial stress. And taking those measures can also double as an investment in the financial wellness and preparedness of our future workforce.

Here to discuss findings from Junior Achievement’s 2015 Teens and Personal Finance Survey, and share some ideas of what companies and their employees can do to address these findings, is Joseph Peri, President of Junior Achievement of New York (JA New York). 

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